Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, has become a key component of the U.S.’ energy
resource strategy. A key to maximizing the effectiveness of fracking is to keep the
proppants placed in the fracture from being returned back at high velocity when
the well is turned around and the production cycle has begun. Historically, this
hazardous situation has been addressed with resin-coated sand because of its ability to create a bonded structure within the propped fracture. However the problem
of proppant flowback remains difficult to address in some applications.

A new type of resin-coated sand created by Preferred Technology and The
Dow Chemical Company addresses this difficulty, providing measurable particle bond strength in the temperature range of 75 to 140 F without the aid of an
external surfactant or activator. Preferred RCS Garnet 2.0 resin-coated sand
delivers this performance with the help of a special polyurethane polymer bonding mechanism that utilizes Dow’s Teraforce technology. When Garnet leaves the
production site it is essentially a fully reacted coating. This means that no further
chemical change needs to occur to facilitate particle to particle bonding.

◗ The Dow Chemical Company, www.dow.com

Fire-resistant Performance Wear
Roughly one million workers today are required to
wear protective, fire-resistant (FR) garments in the U.S.

However, because these protective garments are often
heavy and uncomfortable, workers are reluctant to
wear them and burn accidents are still commonplace.

The iQ Series Comfort Knit Amplitude G2 Flame
Resistant Fabric from Milliken & Company and
Bulwark FR was designed to combine comfort with strong
FR characteristics. It provides flash fire and arc flash
protection while delivering three comfort attributes:
lighter weight, breathability and moisture management.

The overall composition of the iQ Series is a 69:25: 6 cotton, polyester andpodlon mix. The hydroxyl functional groups of thecotton, which provides comfort and strength, serveas covalent attachment points for the cross-linkedchemistry. Micro-denier polyester was chosen foragainst-the-skin comfort and has been highly inte-grated to suppress its melt characteristics. Podlon isan olybenzoxazole fiber that is inherently FR. TheiQ Series FR chemistry is halogen-free, metal-freeand relies on the oxidation of phosphorous, whenburned, to create non-flammable nitrogen gas. Theresult behaves more like performance wear than aheavy, stiff, uncomfortable uniform.

◗ Milliken & Company, www.milliken.com

Stronger with Aluminum

Thermal fatigue is one of the mostimportant properties in materialsused as automobile’s exhaust parts,particularly near the hotter mani-fold section. When the exhaust gaspasses through these parts, theythermally expand or shrink. Butthey can’t do this freely because ofsurrounding parts, which leads themto deform or fracture. The solutionhas long been to add molydenum tothe ferritic heat-resistant stainlesssteels typically used for automobileexhausts. JFE Steel Corp., however, has achieved resistance to thermal fatiguefracture without the use of high-cost molydenum in its JFE-TF1 steel.

The new steel is based on the fact that aluminum has a large effect on
high-temperature properties through solid solution hardening. One of the
primary alloying elements in JFE-TF1 steel is copper, which provides strength
by precipitating as fine particles. However, copper’s benefits are limited beyond

800 C, where it instead solutes into the steel matrix. JFE Steel’s engineers discovered that by adding a small percentage of silicon, they enhance the anti-corrosion ability of aluminum, providing protection beyond 800 C.